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Time is a wife-beater

the great world eater

who batters us

& scatters us

even when he pulls

the punches


Men make monsters

not nearly as frightening

as the matchstick-thin

man with a sickle

who kills us with waiting


Sometime he takes

those young enough

to think themselves immune

while the remainder linger

eroding between the tick

of remorseless clock hands


Death is coming

it is the death

of fat accusing fingers

and frog-faced men

who kill us with drudgery

and a lack of imagination


We rent these bodies

the shell of an intellect

that cannot conceive

a better way than rent

taxes, horseless carriages

that carry us anywhere

but where we wish to go


We are all Cain

We are all Abel

We kill the brother

and are killed by our brother

Inherit violence from

the father

Leach nourishment

from the mother


 
In a world of dust and deserts,

sunlight, snakes and sisters

insects and mountains of garbage

where rain falls on the just

and unjust, on babes and lechers

in homes that become prisons

and streets that become home...


are all hopes false?

or is hope the only cure?

the seed from which we can grow

a better end


I don't know if we ascend

into long halls of light

or descend into endless

tunnels of the night

Maybe its better that way

If all we know for certain

is all we have is today

i\'ve sucked
a desert\'s draught
of dry smoke.

heard the silent
sibulent hints
of cancerous innuendo
that sleeps between
dried leaves, nearly
2 decades of plodding ash.

once we thought this was cool;
that we 
called the tune
& the bugler would lead
us to reason.

science
and bitter experience
has shown
we have been lead
only to an early grave.

but at least we looked good
on the way there--
and for a moment, death too,
was something to be laughed at
with each heedless breath.

it is a romance
as much as madness,
this courtship of death,
an image in a cracked mirror.

cigarretes
have taught us much
about the lost art
of dying gracefully (& dis,)
and of the things we miss

while choking on regret.

Trade the foodstamps for kids
Raise the glass-ceiling bids
Char the charcoal chicanery!

She\'s gone, looking for the next
Modern Masterpiece to replace 
the untrain\'d Disasterpiece
of comic timing

Sic of bravely miming placidity
bringin\' it on home to model
Lingerie for the good emperor
(who sits in state
clad in urine-stain\'d boxers)

\"Honey, were you expecting
Poly-Esther pants, 
fishnet stockings,
A cat-scratch beaver?\"

Go give her regards
To the Narrow Way
To the raised thumb
The ideas hitching rides
On Cereberal Highways
of Live-in-Maids everywhere

No more looking
Acting, selling the drama
to the traumatose
milktoast who can\'t drink
the Milk of Life
being lactose intolerant

\"Remember these breasts?
Wanna tease them?
Please them?\"

Its too late to nip the Teats of Power!
Domestic skullduggery
has its hour,
Marital Apocalypse

This housewife\'s hungry;
A tweleve-story tenement/tourist
trap comes alive
w/curses that creep
like ivy across cooked concrete--
Identified Flying Objects:
golf clubs, trophies & polo shirts,
pin-strip\'d pants and pre-coital condoms
gain the power of flight.

Her feet were soon to follow.

I sit alone
in my gray cubicle
no windows to remind me
I am not being properly
compensated
for the life I am losing
The world is passing me by
Dogs and Daughters
are dying
Fathers, Mothers, Sons, Brothers
dying
while my boss
carelessly cuts, dissects
my life in sequence
for easy consumption
by the corporation
seconds turn into minutes
minutes into hours
hours into days
days into weeks
weeks into months
months into years
years into decades
he is eating my life
one thin, worn dime
at a time
and I am told
when I am old
enough to need it
social security 
will no longer exist
They will put
we geezers out 
to pasture
w/ no healthcare
no life insurance
all of our loved ones
will be dead
but we can eat
all the grass we want.

Hey everybody.  Charles Bowman here, known as HomesickAlienPoet/HAP on the boards.  I was an active member of the community in the days of the first P & A project and am glad to be a part of this rejuvenated incarnation of the site.  I am a poet primarily, though I occasionally dabble in fiction as well.  I have a cousin who is actually making a living as a writer, (screenplay) as well as directing and acting.  His name is Jeffrey Reddick and he is the creator of the Final Destination series.  He has a new movie that will be coming out soon called \"Dead Awake\" so check it out if you are a fan of FD.  (End shameless plug).  As for myself, I went back to college last year and will be graduating from Lindsey Wilson with a bachelor\'s degree in human services and counseling this December.  After graduation, I am going to immediately rollover into the master\'s program.

Shoestrings and sails
led us to separate shores
Eldorado  & Babylon
the mighty and small
stand statuesque or fall
cupp\'d in the palm of Time\'s
calloused clinching/unclinching
hand
a rhythmic reflex
to rise up & crush
the systemic epidemic
dream that is existence.

I\'m too tired to move mountains
when monumental efforts barely
move dumb lips, trained
only to feast fearfully,
never giving back
except when gorged
to point of vomiting.
Its easier, more remote
reliable to pushapen
trap thoughts on paper
spray-paint a grateful wall
leave graffiti on skin
trap insight in a bottle.

Save me Sisyphus
from monotonous 
endeavor.
Let me be
not much moved
by my own cleverness. 

this is the story of it--someone tries to sellthe poison as the cureand always the abscess of regret

politics and a toothache  the hollow hurt at the center of it allthe junkyard doggnawing the bones of hopepolitics and a toothache weeds crack the sidewalkthe good citizens shambledown nosy streets unawarethey are collared and countedby politics and a toothache the mouth is mangled mushmolars, incisors, canineshave long been pulledbut the ache remainsphantom, residual no mere dentist can extractthe politics of a toothache